


Projections Part 2

by harmony88



Series: Forever With You [12]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Family Drama, Romance, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:01:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28043595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/harmony88/pseuds/harmony88
Summary: COMPLETEWhen the Doctor can't sleep, he wanders the TARDIS, and meets his second projection and learns more about what his proper timeline might mean for him and Rose.“Why are you here?” he asked.“You know why,” she said, turning to face him. “If you follow the right timeline, all will be revealed.”“Right,” he said. “Helpful.”“Dear one,” she said again, “you have done well.”***Part of the Forever With You Series, definitely highly suggest reading the other stories first, this is the second turning point in the series***
Relationships: Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Series: Forever With You [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2030980
Comments: 11
Kudos: 132





	Projections Part 2

It was becoming increasingly clear this was a night the Doctor was not going to sleep. Rose was pressed against his chest, still recovering from the overuse of the Vortex energy in her mind, and Martha and Donna were down the hall, most likely asleep as well, but he was wide awake, staring at the ceiling. 

Reflecting. 

He didn’t do that very often, but it had been ten days since Rose was bitten by the robot bug in Alaska. Ten days since they fully bonded, and his world felt infinitely more whole. 

Ten days since he suddenly had more to lose than he did before. 

He knew it was that realization that was keeping him up. It was the first night where he could let his guard down a little, and thoughts were non stop. Their entire trip with Jackie and Pete had been somewhat chaotic, with Jackie insisting they attend every holiday party they could, watching Tony, dealing with the illnesses, meeting Martha… 

Stopping an alien. 

Then they headed to Aquatica straight away, and this trip had felt a little chaotic too, because they had to keep track of not one but two other people and still ended up with a problem to solve.

He had panicked a little when Rose collapsed in his arms on their way back to the TARDIS. 

There was something about watching the love of his life go limp in his grasp after once again doing the impossible that sent his mind running amuck. And he just couldn’t shake whatever uneasiness it was giving him, despite the fact that he _knew_ she was fine. 

She rolled away from him, likely getting too warm under the blankets, and he watched her sleep for a while. Her blonde hair was messy as it laid against the pillows, and her mouth was open just a smidge, and he found himself wondering what she was dreaming about. She looked peaceful, and he sighed. 

He needed to shake this feeling off if he was going to have any chance of sleeping tonight. 

He kissed her cheek before he quietly slipped out of bed and threw a shirt on with his pajama bottoms. He had grown accustomed to wearing comfy clothes to bed over the last few months - Rose insisted the day after they returned from Atlantis that she would not cuddle up against his pinstripes every night for the rest of her life. 

He smiled a little as he remembered that, and made his way to the garden; a room tucked way in the back of one of the winding corridors of his beloved ship, and opened the door carefully. 

There was a projection of the night sky dancing above his head, an effect he had set up years before that always eased his nerves. It had shifted over the years, and after he lost Rose he couldn’t help but project the rosebud nebula as a way to keep her close even when she wasn’t, and he never wanted to remove it, even after he got her back. 

A small creek ran along the middle of the room, where plants and trees and flowers were blooming and standing tall on all sides of him. It smelled of eucalyptus, and he just walked slowly, taking the peace in, and trying to let it ease his wandering thoughts so he could sleep. 

A pulse of light appeared on the sky above him, and his eyes darted to it quickly. His hearts began to race a little, and he tried to push down expectations as the flash appeared again, then again, and slowly transformed into the projection of his mother, standing against the back of the room. She was still translucent, illuminated by a soft pink glow, still just an image, and he found himself frozen in place, unable to speak at first, and unable to stop the thudding of his hearts. 

“Hello, dear one,” she said. 

“Hello,” he said, his voice far away. She smiled at him and began to circle the garden, his eyes trailing her as she moved. 

“It’s beautiful,” she hummed, and he felt his jaw tremble. She was here, which he meant... 

He was following the right path. 

He still didn’t know what that meant, and he felt his head start to spin. But it wasn’t like before, when he first saw her, it didn’t make him feel like he was about to pass out, he didn’t feel like he was about to hyperventilate, but he felt...something. 

Nerves. He was unabashedly nervous. So much so that it was making him a little nauseated, which he thought was highly ridiculous. 

“May I sit?” she asked, gesturing to a small bench between two of the trees. He just nodded and watched her as she looked around. Finally, she looked at him, and patted the bench beside her. “Come.” 

He somehow found the ability to move his legs, and before he fully processed what he was doing, he was sitting beside her, about five inches between them, and he was looking at her as she looked at the sky. 

“You have done well,” she said. 

“With what?” he asked. She turned to look at him, and he suddenly found himself wishing she wasn’t pink and pixelated, but flesh and bone, something he could hold and cling to.

“Everything,” she whispered, and smiled at him. 

He waited for her to say more, but she just seemed content to sit and look at each other, and the burn of her gaze, as pretend as it was, made him uncomfortable and he had to look away, clenching his jaw. She noticed and smiled. 

She said his name in Gallifreyan. He looked back at her and his eyes searched her pink face, wishing she would just spit it out and tell him what he did that was so great and what he was supposed to do next, and if Rose was actually part of whatever this plan was in the way he hoped. Instead she just stood, and began to move around the room again. He took a deep breath. 

“Why are you here?” he asked. 

“You know why,” she said, turning to face him. “If you follow the right timeline, all will be revealed.” 

“Right,” he said. “Helpful.” 

“Dear one,” she said again, “you have done well.” 

“So you’ve said,” he told her, irritation growing just a touch. He remembered the mind games his father would play with a vengeance in this moment. “I don’t know what that means.” 

She looked up at the sky, where the projection of the rosebud nebula rested directly above where she stood. “You made the proper choice.” 

He watched her, his eyes turning up the nebula as well, and he felt his hearts thud faster than they already were. “Which choice was that?” he asked. 

He needed to hear it. He couldn’t infer, or read between the lines, not this time. It’s how he and his father operated for hundreds of years, and while it could be fun at times, it was often murky, and the chance to misinterpret was always strong. He had to be _sure_. 

“Many of them,” she whispered. He clenched his jaw again. 

“Tell me,” he whispered back. Her eyes found his, and she nodded. 

“You went back for her,” she said. “There are versions of the timeline where you didn’t. Versions where she found you instead. Those had a...bittersweet ending. And some had a very sad ending.” 

“So...she is part of this, then?” he asked, ready to explode. She didn’t nod, or say anything, not for a moment, and when she did speak, it was very quiet. 

“Spoilers,” she whispered. “Time will tell all.” 

His throat was tight and he closed his eyes, knowing that was all he would get out of her this time, and he tried to unclench the fist he didn’t realize he had made out of nervousness. 

“Tell me about her,” she said. The Doctor cocked an eyebrow. “Your father may have seen the timelines, dear one, but it was all flashes. I’d like to know more about the woman who stole my son’s hearts.” 

“What do you want to know?” he asked. 

“Well...why her?” she asked. The Doctor looked up at the nebula again, and spoke directly to it. 

“She found me. Saved me. When I didn’t realize I needed saving. She’s stood by me when I know I didn’t deserve it, and has defied...everything.... She makes me better,” he said. It flowed off his tongue without hesitation, and when he looked back at her, she was smiling. 

“Good,” she said. “I am happy for you.” 

“Thank you,” he said. A moment passed, and he felt his nerves beginning to rise again. “You can’t tell me anything? Not if we’re going to be together for at least her lifespan, or -” 

“Shhhh dear one,” she said. “You were always curious. Always thinking ten steps ahead of everything. I’m glad to see that hasn’t changed.” 

He frowned, and decided if she wouldn’t talk he would ask more of questions that had been on his mind for months. “How is the projection of you?” he said. “You died...hundreds of years before the war.”

She sat back down, looking up at the nebula. “Oh, dear one...You know why. Your father was a Time Lord. It may have taken a few hundred years for the timelines he saw to come to fruition, but that doesn't mean he took precautions the moment he knew what was possible.” 

“You’re saying he set these up hundreds of years ago?” he said. She nodded. 

“I’m glad you get to see them. There were many times where timelines could have divulged, and they’d be trapped in time forever,” she said. 

“Yeah,” he said, looking at his feet. “Still could be, I reckon.” 

“True,” she said. “But I doubt it.” 

He looked at her, and she sighed. “It had to be you, you know. I’m sure you’ve wondered for so long, why you were the one. But no one else could have done it.” 

“Why?” he asked. 

“Because of me,” she whispered. “Because of the human bit of me that lives in you.” 

“I was outcast because of that. So were you, so was Father - “ he began, but she raised her hand to stop him. 

“Yes,” she said, “but to be an outcast because of compassion...because you thought more logically about things, because you had the ability to love harder and feel pain deeper, that’s not a bad thing.” 

He shook his head, and opened his mouth to speak, closing it immediately. She said his name. 

“You also have your father in you. The trouble maker that he was, marrying a human…” she said with a small smile. “He never did things the proper way. You had my compassion and his wit and courage, all in that big Time Lord brain of yours. You could do what no other Time Lord could. Make a decision for the _greater good_ , and not just for the sanctity of our home.” 

He saw her looking at the nebula again, but she didn’t say anything more. 

“So you’re saying...it was all pre-determined?” he asked. Rose’s word came to mind: destiny. 

He tried to brush that thought out of his mind, but his mother looked at him intently, and he felt a chill run down his spine, as if she could read his thoughts and was telling him a secret she wasn’t supposed to. 

Hope surged through him. Stronger than it ever had before. 

He watched as she stood back up, walking toward the back of the room again. 

“Where are you going?” he asked. 

“Our time draws near, dear one.” she said. “But I have a gift for you. Look in the library, under your childhood book.” 

Then she was gone. 

He stood at the spot on the wall for a moment, and knew sleep was even less likely now. 

“You alright?” he heard Rose say, and he spun around quickly. She was standing by the doorway, rubbing her eyes a little as she wiped her sleep away. He felt his breath hitch as he looked at her, still in her white dress, wrinkled and messy, but illuminated under the light of the projection. 

“Yeah,” he said. “How are you?” 

“All better,” she assured him with a loose smile. He moved to her, wrapping her in a hug and planting a small kiss on her shoulder. She sighed against him, and squeezed him closer. “I woke up and your heartbeat was racing.” 

He kissed her shoulder again, lingering a little, before he cupped a hand to her cheek. 

“My mother paid me another visit,” he whispered. She stared at him, and he pressed his forehead to hers. 

“Are you okay?” she asked softly, and he nodded, his hair tickling her skin ever so slightly. 

“Yeah. This time I am,” he whispered. “You sure your head is alright?” 

“Yes -” she began, but stopped when she felt him nudge her mind. Her eyes glowed gold, letting him in, and he gently sent the memories of the last twenty minutes to her, along with every wisp of hope, fear, nerves, frustration, and joy. She squeezed his hand as she took it all in, and he watched her, his eyes wide and open, trying to gauge what she thought of it all. 

When it ended, she kept her eyes closed for a moment, and let out a long breath. “Wow.” 

“Yeah,” he said. “I also should have told you before, but...I didn’t. I was afraid I’d mess up and never see her again and it wouldn’t matter, and, well, I would have just gotten your hopes up for no reason, and I -” 

“Doctor,” Rose whispered, her lips millimeters from his, “what is it?” 

“The clock,” he said, grazing it as it rested against her heart, “the script. It says Bad Wolf.” 

She pulled away, locking her hazel galaxies with his chocolates, and he felt her pulse quicken in their rings. She smiled, and wrapped her arms around his, pulling him to her. 

“Rose…” he began, “I think…I…” 

“Me too,” she said. She could sense how he was feeling, and he sighed. He wanted to say that he felt, without almost any doubt now, that whatever was going to happen was designed for them to be together. But he found himself unable to say it, just in case it wasn’t true. Just in case… 

In case he still lost her. 

He held her close, grateful she understood, and he smiled when he felt her press her lips to his, soft, slow, warm, gentle. 

His hand was still cupping her cheek, and he applied a bit of pressure, trying to savor every ounce of her for as long as he could. 

She pulled away after a moment, a little breathless, and she slipped her hand into his. “Do you want to go now?” 

He bit his cheek, and nodded. “Do you want to change first?” 

“Yeah,” she admitted, chuckling. 

“I tried to help you out of that, just so you know. You kicked me,” he said, smirking. 

“I did not,” she said, rolling her eyes. 

“You so did, Rose Tyler! Right in the cheek, see?” he said, and smiled at her. She kissed the spot he was pointing at, and he grinned. “Come on.” 

They took a few minutes, laughing over nothing, and he forgot why he was so worried an hour earlier as Rose threw on a t-shirt and sleep shorts. She found the Doctor’s hand on their way to the library. 

“What did she mean - your childhood book?” Rose asked. The Doctor gave her a look, a gleam in his eye.

He had always wanted to show her this. 

“There’s a restricted area I keep secluded from my companions. It’s through here,” he said, leading her up the stairs to the second level. They walked down the rows of books for a moment, until she saw him scan a row of red, leather bound copies with his sonic screwdriver, and the shelf flipped upside down. 

A hundred of the most beautiful books she had ever seen sat before her, with a bright gold script on the spines she knew to be Gallifreyan. She smiled, her hand tracing the lines and circles of the one closest to her, and he watched her, entranced. 

For a moment, his mind flashed to images of Rose reading one of those books on the sofa with him, fifty years from now but looking exactly the same, and she looked over at him, her hand dropping from the shelf. 

“What was that?” she asked. He swallowed hard and grabbed her hand. 

“A dream,” he said. “One I’m allowing myself to hope for, at least for tonight.” 

“I like it,” she said, and kissed him. He deepened it immediately, his hope catching up with him, and he had her pinned against the shelves as his mouth tangoed with hers. He lifted her up, wrapping her legs around his waist, as he continued to kiss her, and she gasped when his lips found her neck. 

He was finding it hard to control himself. 

_You went back for her._

Those words rang in his head, and he realized, in that moment, what his mother meant. 

That one decision - that had been the start of all of this, he could feel it. His connection to time was spinning around him as she kissed him, and it was making him dizzy. 

He had seen glimpses of the other timelines his mother mentioned, usually in his nightmares. 

The one that plagued him the most, his most recurring nightmare, was of Rose crying on a beach, with him staring at a gold projection of her in the TARDIS as the wind he couldn’t feel whipped her hair across her perfect face. 

But the rest of those timelines were locked to him now. He can’t see them, he can’t even try to search for them. And he realized, as Rose dug her nails into his skin, that going back for her was a fixed point, and he can’t _believe_ he didn’t see that before now. It set up the domino effect for whatever his father hoped would happen, and he bit her shoulder as he melded his body into hers against the shelf, unaware of how or when their clothes came off, and as he moved with her, her head arched back and her hands began throwing the precious books on the ground. He didn’t care, and he just moved harder and faster as she tried to apologize for it, trying to wipe that word from her vocabulary. 

She had nothing to be sorry for. 

She was right. 

She was _right_. 

And it was at that moment, another realization hit him. That losing her was absolutely, inconsequentially something that had to happen. Nothing he did could have prevented it. It was predetermined, fate, destiny, whatever you wanted to call it, just as Rose had said. 

Her goddamn Instincts may just be one of the sexiest things about her. 

Losing her wasn’t the problem, _finding_ her was. 

And he made the right choice. 

He heard her scream his name in Gallifreyan and it brought him back, and he moaned loudly. 

He will never be able to get over that. 

“I love you,” he growled, and she cried out, screaming her love back. 

He realized she must be feeling all these realizations too, as their minds were connected, and it might have been a bit overwhelming for her, as he saw tears streaming down her cheeks. He kissed them away, licking the salt with his tongue, and a surge of hot love shot through him, just as she clenched around him and cried out his name again. 

That was his undoing as well, and he followed soon after, holding her tightly as they both collapsed to the floor, and she rested on top of him, panting. He started laughing, so unbelievably happy, and it caused her to look at him like he was crazy for a moment, until his grin rubbed off on her, and she started to laugh too. 

She pressed her lips to his chest as the laughter subsided, and he brushed her hair away from her face, thinking she was the most beautiful thing in their entire universe. She bit her lip, and shifted off of him, leaning against the near empty bookshelf, holding his hand. 

“Thank you,” he said. 

“For what?” she said softly. 

“Your unwavering faith,” he told her, “it means more than I can ever tell you.” 

She squeezed his hand, and rubbed her lips together, looking at him lovingly. “You make it easy.” 

“Yeah?” he asked. 

“Yes,” she said. “I’m never gonna leave you.” 

He felt his throat tighten, and he moved to sit next to her, pulling her to him so her head rested against his shoulder. “Not if I have anything to say about it,” he whispered. 

She smiled, as that was not the answer she expected. She didn’t know what she expected honestly after all these realizations he just shared with her, but in the past he had said everything from nothing, to “never say never ever” to “I want that to be true”, and this, for the first time, felt like he believed her. 

He kissed her, and he finally looked around the room, biting the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing over the fact they threw some of the most respected and revered texts of his homeland on the ground for a shag. 

His people would call it sacrilege. 

“That wasn’t a shag, Doctor,” Rose whispered, her chin resting on his shoulder. “That was a new chapter.” 

His eyes met hers, and he brushed his thumb along her lips. “I s’pose it was, wasn’t it?” 

He kissed her again, and they slowly slipped their clothes back on, moving the books back in place with glances and chaste kisses. 

“You never answered my question, you know,” she said as she put one of the larger books on the shelf. “What is your childhood book?” 

He looked around, and spotted it, resting beneath another. His picked it up, and handed it to her. 

It was small, more like a journal than any of the other texts she had handled so far, and she looked at him. 

_Can I open it?_

_Please._

The pages were worn, but drawings and notes and ideas covered every inch. It was all in Gallifreyan, but she still understood that it _was_ a journal, and his innermost thoughts and dreams were resting in the palm of her hand. He came up behind her, looking over her shoulder, and placed his pointer finger on one drawing. 

“That was my idea for a vortex manipulator. Should have trademarked it,” he said, and he winked at her when she looked up at him. She flipped the page. “Oh, oh, oh Rose! This was a wormhole manipulator upgrade I wanted to try! I forgot about that!” 

She handed him the book, watching him with a sense of awe as his face lit up like a Christmas tree. He was laughing, telling her about more ideas for inventions, laughing at jokes only he thought was funny, and she couldn’t stop smiling. 

He hugged her. 

And she noticed, over his shoulder, a piece of paper sitting on the shelf, all by itself. 

She moved to it and picked it up. It was split diagonally down the middle, and she handed it to him, unsure of what she was looking at. 

“It’s a...blueprint,” he said quietly. “That’s…” 

He moved to the shelf, running his hand along it, and his face was creased in confusion. “What?!” 

She saw him scan the shelf, and he was shaking his head. “This wasn’t here before,” he said. “It must be what my mother wanted me to have.” 

“The TARDIS hides things sometimes,” Rose said, placing the final book they had knocked off the shelves back. He looked at her, amazed, and looked back at the blueprint. 

“Quite right,” he said. “I...I can’t tell what this is, Rose.” 

He handed it to her, and she felt her stomach flip over at the mere thought that he thought she might. 

All the writing was Gallifreyan, and she was at a loss. “I’m sorry,” she said. 

“The main mechanism is hidden. It’s a machine of some sort, but...I don’t know what it’s used for,” he said. 

“Was it something from your book? Or something your father was working on?” she asked. 

“Maybe,” he said. “Possibly, especially the latter.” 

“We’ll find the other half,” she said. “It has to be part of this somehow.” 

He looked at her sadly for a moment, reminding her through their bond that Gallifrey was gone and it was possible this blueprint was lost with it, but she bit her lip and shook her head. 

“Why would they leave this for you, then?” she asked. He clenched his jaw. 

“You’re right,” he said, smiling at her just a little. He folded it, placing it in his journal, and turned back to the shelves. His brow furrowed, and he looked at Rose in amazement. 

“What?” she asked. 

“They’re in alphabetical order,” he said. “The books. I...didn’t tell you how to do that...did I?” 

She shook her head, and shrugged. “I just matched the pretty ones together.” 

He burst out laughing, and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, kissing the top of her head. Suddenly, he felt exhaustion hit him, finally, and Rose looked at him. “Bedtime?” 

“Yes, please,” he whispered, and kissed her again. 

He scanned the shelves again, and they flipped back over to the decoy books. Hand in hand, with the Doctor’s journal still tucked under his arm, they made it back to their bedroom, and cuddled close. 

Rose, not so sleepy, smiled as the roles reversed for the night. And now her mind was spinning with thoughts of what he had seen with his mother, the things he had put together, and the unwavering hope and excitement she felt from it all. She pulled his clock from around her neck and stared at the script, tracing it just like she had with the books, and whispered the words Bad Wolf in perfect Gallifreyan. 

He flipped over, apparently not quite asleep yet, and stared at her. “What did you just say?” 

“What?” she asked. He sat up, and flipped the light on. 

“Rose, do you know what you just said?” he asked more seriously. 

“I...I dunno, I just...I sounded it out,” she said. 

“You _sounded_ it out?” he said. “It’s an ancient language. It’s a dead language. I never speak it, how -” 

“Doctor,” she said, sensing his agitation through their hearts and minds, though their mind bond was mostly closed as he had drifted so close to sleep. “I’m sure it’s not that big of a deal.” 

He looked at her. He said “I love you” in Gallifreyan. 

“What?” she asked, and he let out a breath. 

“Nothing,” he said, feeling the wave crash down as he ran a hand over his face. “I thought…” 

“What?” she asked. He looked at her. 

“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “Come here.” 

He pulled her to him, and she bit her lip. “What did I say?” 

“Bad Wolf,” he said. “You read it.” 

She didn’t say anything, but she looked back at the clock in her hands and her thumb trailed the circles again. She bit her lip, wanting to keep trying to read more, but she slipped it back over her head so it rested against her heart. She settled down in bed, pulling him down to meet her. “Let’s go to sleep, yeah?” 

“Yeah,” he whispered. 

“I love you,” she told him, and he smiled. 

“I love you, Rose.” 

They fell asleep, tangled together, unaware of how much their lives would soon change.

**Author's Note:**

> Ahhhhhh I don't know how to feel. I hope you all like it, and stay tuned for more adventures and more answers. We're in the latter half of this series I'd say. :)


End file.
